


Everlasting

by dmwrites



Category: Original Work
Genre: Death Rituals, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 09:23:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12814509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dmwrites/pseuds/dmwrites
Summary: The Memory Ravagers really did nothing to deserve that name.I should know. I gave it to them.





	Everlasting

**Author's Note:**

> read on my blog: [Everlasting](https://mirthblade.wordpress.com/2017/11/24/everlasting/)

The Memory Ravagers really did nothing to deserve that name.

I should know. I gave it to them.

We weren't always on such bad terms. I was one of those just-builts who walk into the Memory Preservers' with their eyes shining and their fingers itching to sink into someone else's mind. They sit at their Everlasting terminals that first time with their lips spread wide in excitement; they take a deep breath, but it does not come out with the wondrous laughter that they expected would bring some life back into the dead. They've been told the job is boring, but the idea of wandering through someone else's memories seems awfully romantic until you see for yourself that you have to wade through hours of the dearly departed resting and picking his nose and mending his skin before you even begin to touch the oh-so-happy memories the loved ones have requested for their Everlasting movie. I suppose the extraction process could be described as jarring the first time you experience it, but even that becomes tedious on your second week of piecing Lasters together, and, to be honest, you can get a marginally better high when you flick at the ghost of your mem-port, so why anyone would do the job with any sort of enthusiasm after they've been at it for years is completely beyond me.

I can admit the only reason I did it for so long was spite. My grandmother, though an utter nightmare in all other ways, hadn't been religious for most of my life, but then one of her woodcarving friends turned out to be crafty in more than one ways and somehow managed to turn memory privacy into Grandma's greatest passion. When she finally broke apart, rest her creaky joints, I had half a mind to make a little Laster out of all of the wonderful times she’d told me my entire existence was a mistake so that the entire world could remember her the same way I did, but then I realized I was more than likely to be the only one to ever witness that brilliant act of supreme pettiness, so in the end I resisted the temptation. Knowing her, she had probably made her chip rot in her brain by sheer force of will just before she closed her eyes for the last time, anyway. I’ll never know if that s the case; she’d explicitly stated that she wished not to have her memories tampered with, and I had no valid reason to disrespect that. You can rarely get the rights over the corpse of your abuser, even if they had ruled over your living body long enough for it to leave lasting damage. Everlasting, if you will.

Her inflicting that damage would be the only prominent thing in my movie, if I got one when I died. The alternative would be a Laster showing me at work, exploring others’ lives in lieu of living my own. I don't know which option would be sadder. I'm tempted to give them creative freedom over it, if only to make a lucky Ravager's day even more boring, if that is possible at all. They'll probably resort to using the one photo I have of me as an actual just-built in my mother's arms, have my altar set up all retro, no moving images, no lights, no love. Nothing. It would be very fitting for the life I'd have lived, now that I think about it. I almost wish I could be there to see it for myself.

I'd had dreams of moving up the ladder, initially. Everyone in the business knows the mundane Lasters are the most boring to create, but no one tells you there is no moving from the division once you settle in. You can put in all the requests you want to move up to History or Celebrity, or even to do client surveys, but no one ever takes you seriously. You would think there's some kind of conspiracy going on, people manipulating the images of important figures, withholding evidence, keeping juicy secrets to themselves, but no. They’re just elitist bastards who want to feel like they're the only ones important enough to do the sort of work the public was actually interested in. So I never moved. I didn’t leave. I just stayed there, mechanical and everlasting and mundane.

And then she walked into my little office.

Her name was Jo. She looked way too young to be thinking of her final rest yet, so I assumed she would be making arrangements for one of her relatives. Her eyes darted around, never settling for too long, and her fingers, spattered with ink, clutched at her purse in a way that made me wonder if her Grandma was still alive.

“How can I help you, Jo?” I asked her.

For a moment she just rubbed the back of her head, and I wondered if she had port pains left over from her childhood. Mine had disappeared by the time I could walk, but I remember how agonizing the ache could become, and what a relief it was when the port finally closed over completely and I could no longer feel the edge of my chip under my scalp.

“I’m here to request an extraction,” she said, voice steady, as if she had rehearsed the line before she came in. “I want it done as soon as possible.”

“We generally schedule extractions in compliance with the preparation of the altar,” I replied. “You could speak to the funeral home and—”

“No,” she cut me off. “No funeral. No altar. Now,” she continued, and she pointed at the back of her head in explanation.

I was suddenly very grateful they’d decided to award me with a private office for my years of dutiful work.

“While you still live?” I asked, and I hated the little waver in my voice that gave away my excitement at the idea. She gave me a curt nod and I stifled a sigh. “No,” I told her, voice as firm as I could make it. “It’s against company policy.”

“But it’s not illegal,” she insisted. She’d been expecting the refusal. “I give you my consent. No other company does what you do. I need a Laster,” she said, and she placed her hand on top of mine. I resisted the urge to pull away when I recognized the desperation in her eyes.

I didn’t want to get her hopes up, but I had to ask. “Why?” Why would anyone go through the pain of having their memory ripped right out of their skull just to make a damn movie?

“I’m getting married next month,” she said, looking down, and her features softened as she went on. “My wife-to-be, she… She lost her sight before we ever met. I have a list of dates,” she said, and pulled out a tattered little notebook out of her bag. “I’ve kept it since I found out I had a chip and what it does. I want to show her my life. Before and after her.”

I frowned. “You did that just in case you met someone like her?”

She nodded. “Either that, or I figured it’d make your life easier and give you specific things to look at for my Laster, when the time came.”

“You must have been an interesting child,” I said, and it startled a laugh out of her. I pulled my hand from under hers and tried to appear professional again. “Even if we could do this for you—and we can’t—I’m afraid I don’t see the point. She still won’t be able to see the movie if she has no eyes. Or are you planning a replacement right before the wedding?”

She shook her head.

“What would be the point of making a Laster, then?”

“Let me worry about that,” she said, and I felt some of the sympathy I felt for her dissipate.

“You’re lying to me,” I said, and her eyes widened in confusion more than guilt. “Either that, or…”

Or she had figured out a way to merge her memories with someone else’s.

I gave her a long look. “How?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Then I can’t help you.”

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment. “I can’t tell you. It’s not my safety on the line.”

“But it is mine. And you haven’t told me anything, not really. You—or someone close to you—built some sort of merger. But you can’t build an extractor, which is odd, because merging should be significantly more difficult, or else someone in our company would have figured it out already.”

“Who says they didn’t?” she said, and her expression made me wonder for a second if there wasn’t some conspiracy, after all.

Just for a second.

“How did your brother figure it out?”

Her eyes widened again. “How did you know?”

I shrugged. “I didn’t. I just guessed.”

She looked like she was trying to guess how much force she’d have to use to knock me out if she hit me with her bag. “He’s a smart man,” was all she said.

“I’m sure he is.” _Just not smart enough to stop you from doing this._

We were quiet for a while.

“Why did you come here?” I asked her in the end. “You knew I’d say no.”

“I had to try, at the very least,” she muttered. “I know it was too much to ask. But think about it – would it be that terrible to use Lasters at celebrations, too, not just at partings?”

“That’s not even what the issue is about,” I said. “We just don’t have the technology to extract a living person’s memories in a safe way. If I try—and I say again that I won’t—it won’t be just painful for you, it would most probably kill you.”

“But are you certain?” she said, and I shook my head.

“You can’t be willing to die for this. Wouldn’t you prefer to stick around for years and be there for your wife, instead of leaving her with a few memories that won’t do her any good?”

She looked down again, her fingers tracing over the cover of her notebook. “I wanted to share this with her,” she said. I still couldn’t understand why, and I doubted she would share her reasons with me, even if she was willing to give me her memories.

“You might be able to, someday,” I said. “The way things are now, we can’t even talk about anyone tampering with living people’s memories for reasons outside of health and forensics, you know that. Your brother has created something that could be very dangerous if it falls in the wrong hands.”

“We’ll make sure it doesn’t,” she swore, but she must have seen something in my face. “Please, don’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t,” I promised. “As long as you walk out of here and do not approach any of my colleagues with your request.”

She pursed her lips together. “I have to try.”

“Do it and face the consequences.”

It sounded surprisingly convincing for the first threat I’d ever uttered in my life. I wasn’t entirely sure the bluff was just as successful. I had no real power over her, and I would never actually tell on her brother; I did not care about integrity as much as I had to pretend to, but other people did. It would get ugly.

She said nothing.

I sighed and got a card from the stack I kept on my desk. “You can reach me on this number. If you feel like doing something stupid, give me a call first. I may be able to talk you out of it.”

She huffed as she looked at the card. “Charlie,” she said, and I realized I hadn’t even introduced myself when she entered, and my ID was in my drawer. “Why do you care if I do something stupid?”

I shrugged. “You seem like a decent person.”

 _So what?_ She didn’t say it, but the question was written on her face and echoed in my own mind.

“You remind me of a friend I had,” I lied, figuring it would be a more acceptable reason than _I hate my fucking job and I’m not giving the fucks I work for anything more than the bare minimum_. “She would have wanted me to help you.” _And my grandmother would have fucking hated it._

It was bullshit, but she seemed to find it acceptable. She opened up her notebook and got a pen from between two pages filled with scribbles, then grabbed another card from the stack. She wrote what I assumed was her own information on the back of it and slid it in front of me.

“In case you change your mind,” she said. We both knew it wasn’t likely, but I nodded and took it in my hand. “Well, then,” she said and stood up. She looked around my office, but she didn’t find anything else to say. “Thank you for your time.”

“Of course. Good luck with the wedding,” I said.

“Thank you,” she said with a small smile.

She left my office with no more fuss and I thought that would be the end of it.

 

And then, a little more than a week later, I found myself on her doorstep.

I kept rehearsing my little speech in my head. _Hello, hi, it’s Charlie, do you remember me? Yes, hi, no, I still can’t help you, but could I maybe look at your brother’s invention, even if I have nothing to give you in return?_

It was almost a relief when the door opened and it wasn’t Jo standing on the other side, but a man I hadn’t met before.

“Hello,” I said. “I’m looking for Jo?” I was beginning to hope she’d given me the wrong address.

“She’s not here,” the man said with no particular expression on his face. He looked me up and down. “Who are you?”

“Doesn’t matter,” I said, already backing away. “You don’t have to tell her I looked for her.”

“You’re Charlie, aren’t you?” he asked before I got too far, hopefulness sneaking into his tone. I nodded. “She knew you’d come.”

“I didn’t,” I replied in all honesty. He smiled a little. “You’re her brother, then?”

He nodded. “Name’s Ben. Would you like to come in? They’ll be home soon, I’m sure they’d both love to talk with you.”

I hesitated, but then I nodded and he stepped to the side to let me pass.

“Can you process coffee or food at all?” he asked as he led me through the house.

I stopped and looked at him. “How did you know?”

He smirked a little. “You asked her if Thea would be getting eye _replacement_. Not an awfully human thing to say. And I imagine I’d be bored to death doing your job if I weren’t, you know, enhanced. No offence.

I laughed. “None taken.”

“No coffee, then?”

“No coffee.”

He got a cup for himself and we walked into a living room filled with paintings on every wall and surface possible. “Are you a collector?” I asked.

Ben looked around and let out a little laugh. “I guess it seems like a bit much at first. But no, they’re all Jo’s.”

“She’s an artist?” I asked, remembering her stained hands and the drawings in her notebook.

“Been doing it all her life,” he said, and I stopped in my tracks again, though not from surprise this time. “What is it?” he asked me when he motioned for me to sit but I just shook my head.

“How does the merger work?”

He huffed. “I’m not telling you that.”

“No, I don’t want…” I took a breath. “What would you need the movie to be on? If we managed to make a Laster, what would you need it to be stored on? An ordinary mem-chip? A Laster drive? What do you need?”

“A Laster drive would be best, I built the reader with your tech in mind,” he said. He gave me a long look. “Are you going to do it?”

“Not what she requested, but we could…” I bit my lip. “If we scan her paintings we could…”

“Thea could see them,” he said, voice merely above a whisper. “Can you do that?”

“I can try,” I said, and he jumped up with excitement, coffee spilling everywhere.

“We need to tell them,” he said. “Where’s my—”

“Please don’t,” I said before he could call Jo. “We don’t know if it’ll work, I don’t wanna get their hopes up. You could surprise them with it if it does?”

He thought about it before he nodded. He took a step closer to me and gave me a long look. “Why are you doing this? Won’t you get in trouble if they catch you?”

“Probably,” I said with a shrug.

“Why, then?”

I smiled a little. “My job is really fucking boring.”

He laughed and clapped a hand on my shoulder.

 

So that is how I found myself getting fired for producing an unauthorized Everlaster.

And giving an angry anonymous interview that might have snowballed into a series of articles and calls for inspections of all the company’s projects and the staff currently working on them.

Oops.

I’d managed to hide the end result of my efforts from my bosses and made sure the Laster made its way to Ben without anyone else noticing. He might have called me afterwards to let me know if it even worked, or Jo might have called to tell me he tried it on himself and his head exploded, but I was a bit too busy doing nothing with my newly-acquired free time to notice anything that wasn’t my bed or a trashy movie I’d never had the will to watch before.

The first call I answered after I lost my job only got my attention because it came in the middle of the night. I picked up, figuring I might as well tell whoever is calling to fuck off.

“Yes.”

“Charlie? It’s Jo.” Her voice sounded rough, but I doubted it was because she’d just gotten up, as well.

“Oh,” came my intelligent reply. “Are you crying?”

“Of course I’m crying, you asshole. Thank you.”

“What for?” I asked.

“Charlie.” I snorted at her scolding tone. “I know you did it.”

“You can’t prove anything.”

“And thank fuck for that. Were you the one to start that shitshow surrounding Everlasting?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Asshole.”

“I have no idea what I did to make you comfortable enough to take that tone with me.”

“Yes, you do,” she said. She sounded calmer now, and a lot happier than the only time I’d met her face to face. “You should come visit us sometime.”

“Listen, I might have gotten fired for you, but that doesn’t mean we’re friends or anything.”

“You got fired?” She hesitated. “Charlie, I…”

“You don’t have to say anything,” I cut her off. “Did she like it?”

“Yes. She loved it.”

“Good.”

“Thank you, Charlie. Really. We’ll never forget this.”

“That’s kind of the point of making Lasters in the first place. I think. That’s the idea I got after twenty years of making them, anyway.”

“Charlie.”

“Jo.”

She sighed. “You’re kind of weird, you know that?”

“Yes.”

“But decent, too.”

“Okay.”

She sighed again. “Just. Stop by sometime, okay? Thea would like to meet you.”

“I’m not making any promises,” I said. “But I’ll think about it.”

“That’s all I needed to hear,” she replied. “I have to go now.”

“Alright. Congrats on the marriage.”

She laughed. “Thanks. I hope I’ll see you soon.”

I grunted in reply and hung up.

It took a while for me to wipe the smile off my face and relax enough to fall asleep again.

 

**Author's Note:**

> **read my other stories:**   
>  [netheia](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12744357)   
>  [you wish](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12445152)   
>  [to_katie](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11600445)   
>  [the fall show](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11290392)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> follow me on twitter: [dmwrites](https://twitter.com/dmwrites)


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